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The opening of new archival sources often turns up surprising and interesting information. For example, one of political activist Lillian Hellman's biographers discovered in intellectual Joseph L. Rauh Papers statements by Hellman confirming her Communist Party membership in the late 1930's, an affiliation previously vigorously denied in some circles although suspected in others. Rauh, a leading civil liberties lawyer, had been Hellman's counsel when she prepared for a confrontation with the United States Congress House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1952. Hellman was prepared to testify regarding her own Communist activity but not to name others. Rauh's files contain drafts of a statement regarding her Communist affiliation that Hellman would give should HUAC agree to her condition. Joseph Rauh handled many important internal security cases in the late 1940's and 1950's, and historians will find much of interest in his legal files on his successful defense of playwright Arthur Miller, his removal of the Independent Socialist League from the Attorney General's list of subversive organizations, and his files on the hotly debated lawyer William Remington prejury case. The Ludwig Donath file in the Rauh Papers is an example of chance discovery of an unknown episode in the history of Hollywood Communism and the show business blacklist.

African First Ladies are categorised into two: the less powerful First Ladies, the behind-the-scene actors, making positive contributions to their spouses’ regime and the powerful First Ladies whose arbitrary powers and overarching presence pose real threat to the regime. Extant studies concentrate on the former and pay scant attention to the latter. Drawing on the activities of Patience Goodluck Jonathan, Nigeria’s former First Lady, this paper explores the ways Patience and other powerful African First Ladies contribute to regime change in emerging African democracies. In doing so, the paper explores the anatomy of female power and its intricate interface with the Office of the First Lady, the framework for appropriating and exercising the power of the First Lady. The goal is to provide the theoretical basis for understanding the empirical, that is, the practical ways Patience Jonathan and other powerful First Ladies appropriate power and contribute to regime change in Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Technological development is rapidly having an impact on the road freight transport system. In parallel, there are suggestions for new types of business models to approach the network and complex features of business. In this paper, we raise the question of what this means in the road freight transport business from a truck manufacturer's perspective. The purpose is to analyse the contents of and developments in networked business models for road freight transport in Sweden with the overall aim to contribute to sustainable transport solutions. The paper builds on a qualitative case study methodology of a truck OEM. The results display three forms of networked business models: business models in stable, established and emerging networks. The stable business model is based on the present situation with the truck at the centre. The established business model is partly based on the present and partly on the future with the focus on uptime of the trucks. The emerging business model is future-oriented and contains technological development of connectivity, electrification and automation. Managerial implications regard that coping with the emerging business is necessary but result in great uncertainty regarding how to interact, which resources to invest in and how to coordinate activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobility as a Service (MaaS) integrates different transportation services into a single on-demand mobility service to promote sustainable mobility. A challenge is how to innovate new business models for MaaS as it demands an understanding of how various actors position themselves within a MaaS ecosystem and how value creation changes in such ecosystems. While different streams of research on MaaS business model innovation have applied an ecosystem approach, the approach has been limited to a focal actor or the relationships between a few actors. This paper reviews academic literature and consultancy reports on business models for MaaS and presents an integrated framework that describes actors' roles and relationships in MaaS ecosystems as well as types of business models. In doing so, the paper contributes to an understanding of the interlinked character of value creation and value capture – two central parts of any business model – in MaaS. Based on the findings, the paper argues that taking an ecosystem approach to the analysis of MaaS business models can be a way to fully capture the complexity of value creation and value capture in MaaS business models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is set in the context of a yearlong cultural programme and the relations initiated and developed (or not) between the organisers and their sponsors. Empirically we are set in 2014, and Limerick's year as Irish National City of Culture. Theoretically, we consider the particular dynamics arising from the (sets of) sponsorship relationship dyads, where each party frames the interaction in different ways. Taking a case study approach the paper examines multiple sponsorships operating during the CoC year. The findings point to multiple time frames, offerings, and narratives operating between managers on both side of the dyad. As such the 'relationship(s)' under study are each considered multiple, that is, they are practiced and performed differently by the different actors involved. The paper contributes to the theory and practice of sponsorship by identifying how managers, on both sides of the dyad coordinate the mismatches that this context can trigger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Michael Rush sheds light on the Japanese 'Nordic Turn' in the family policy, including a father-friendly parental leave scheme after the 2000s in his work published in 2015. Despite this and the Japanese Government's apparent desire to encourage fathers to take parental leave, the policy does not seem effective as in Nordic countries. This paper examines what makes Japan's statutory parental leave scheme difficult to work like the ones in Nordic countries by analyzing the process of the amendments of the leave scheme after the 2014 amendment. The study pays particular attention to the views expressed by the various actors involved in the law-making process on the issue of the inconsistency between bonus months, which is a father quota, and the special extension of parental leave in case of no childcare place, and how this was reflected in the final bill. The paper reveals that the process was not confined to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare but was heavily influenced by the work of the Cabinet Office, project teams of the ruling party, and private groups promoting work-life balance measures. Partly because of this, the Japanese parental leave system has diverged significantly from the Nordic and German systems to which it was originally referred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper takes, as it's starting point, the statements of solidarity with Black and non-White students in UK drama schools which were issued in the summer of 2020 and tracks the commitments made against the writers, directors and actors who took part in the graduation shows of the following academic year. It analyses how (or if) change of representation was established in the sector as a whole and also on an institution-by-institution basis. Suggestions are made as to further changes that could be made in the actor training sector, and, by implication, all higher educational establishments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strategic stability can mitigate the security dilemma that mutual deterrence efforts produce. If two parties agree on what the most destabilising peacetime or wartime behaviour is, they are more likely to agree on risk-reduction measures. However, contemporary security actors rarely share views of what constitutes destabilising behaviour, given political disagreements and asymmetries in deterrent measures due to varying military capabilities, technology adaptations and threat perceptions. This paper examines the deterrence dynamics between NATO and Russia, demonstrating how asymmetric views of strategic stability add potential security dilemmas to the already-severe political confrontation between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the various appearances of theater in the writings of L. S. Vygotsky. Starting with an overview of his early and still little explored production of theatrical criticism, we observe how theater gradually entered the field of psychology and came to be analyzed as a psychological problem. The analysis of this topic reveals an important shift in Vygotskian thought, i.e., a turn from objective to concrete psychology. With respect to Vygotsky's aesthetic stance, the paper provides a commentary about the relations between art and society, an underlying topic for the cultural-historical perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes towards growing interest in the role of actors and agency in regional innovation policy processes. While entrepreneurial agency has begun to be explored, the paper broadens this focus to include actor roles in the maintenance of regional innovation policies over time. Drawing on the concept of institutional work, and evidence from Wales, it finds maintenance to be a process of strategic care, involving interplay between structural factors promoting durability, and normative and deterrence practices at the regional level. These practices, it suggests, can contribute towards stability and persistence, but with mixed effects over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the third of a four-part series of interrelated articles discussing the pedagogical, ideological, and sociological functions of the audition process in drama school training. For this third paper, we have re-interviewed our contributors in 2019, as they come towards the end of their formal training. We have asked them to compare their experiences of professional auditions with their experiences of auditioning for drama school recounted for the first two papers. Their accounts describe a complex and contradictory response to the process of audition which negates any possible interpretation of a linear or progressive development. This is apparently at odds with the pedagogic strategies pursued during their studies. Aiming to explain that dissonance we draw on the Bergsonian concepts of "clock time" and "psychological time" to help to classify and analyse these experiences, broadly categorizing these with reference to an actor's own conscious states in audition. Using Stanislavksi's writing as a key point of reference allows us to align our theorization with his discussion of a long-term and indeterminant pedagogical process of actor development. This is also counterpointed by Stanislavski's recognition that technique, no matter how it has been acquired or how competently it may have been mastered may not be sufficient for the actor to exercise her craft. In the last section of this article, we utilize Csikszentmihalyi theorization of "flow" states in order to reinforce the distinction felt by our interviewees between auditions determined by/in "clock time" and those inscribed within/by the psychological time, which Bergson calls la durée. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Narrative video ads often use either celebrities or unknown actors to engage consumers and convey their messages. Although research suggests that celebrities (versus unknown actors) may enhance the effects of narrative videos on brand attitudes, this hypothesis has yet to be empirically tested, and the mechanisms behind such potential effects remain unclear. We compared the effects of celebrities and unknown actors in narrative video ads on brand attitudes and examined potential pathways through which actor type might increase or decrease persuasion. In Studies 1(a) through 1(c) and 3 we used a narrative video in two distinct versions: the original with a celebrity and an alternative where we used face-swapping technology to replace the celebrity with an unknown actor. In Study 2 we analyzed responses to unmodified ads. In Studies 1(a) through 1(c) and 2 we found no evidence that the celebrity actor increased transportation into the story or identification with the actor, but we consistently observed that celebrities increased perceptions of a parasocial relationship with the actor. However, this effect was not enhanced for a narrative video ad compared to a nonnarrative one in Study 3. Furthermore, celebrity actors were associated with reduced retrospective reflection in the path models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is an old debate in social science, what is most influential, actors or structures? The paper resumes the discussion by concretely asking, how can the radical policy shift towards West Africa in the wake of the terrorist attacks on the US in September 11, 2001, be explained by applying an agency-structure approach? The article applies a theoretical framework combining neo-classical realist thinking with the reasoning found in historical institutionalism. Concepts like path dependency and critical juncture are helpful. The roles and priorities of the core foreign policy actors in the United States and in the European Union are discussed before the article identifies international and domestic structures that might constrain the role and influence of the relevant foreign policy decision-makers. It is concluded that neither international nor domestic structures represented strong obstacles to the foreign policy decision makers’ ambitions to implement radical policy changes towards West Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Questions on power exercise by natural resource actors and inherent conflicts have gained traction in scientific and policy circles in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), although there is virtual neglect of harmful convictions embedded in the exercise of power. To bridge this gap, this paper explores power and convictions around land and linked natural resources in Cameroon. Data was generated through focus group discussions (N = 14), key informant (N = 44) and expert interviews (N = 19). The analysis drew from the actor-centered power lens employing thematic and content analysis. The results indicate the following: First, while gender-based and elitism-based harmful convictions significantly shape land and linked natural resource access, region/ethnic-based and religion-based convictions were less significant. Second, actors championing gender-based convictions employ more coercive approaches, while elitist and political actors make use of incentives. This study informs the actor-centered power (ACP) approach, with emphasis on the convictions embedded in the exercise of power during natural resource acquisition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a re-examination of the histographies of theatre for development (TfD) which takes into account the background influences, cultures and agendas of complex networks of actors, organizations, governments, and higher education institutions in which the practice and praxis of TfD revolve. The article introduces and reflects on my ongoing research, in which I argue for a new research paradigm that will aid researchers, practitioners, and theorists to understand the complex nature of their work. Moreover, I seek to narrow the reader's attention to important but missing elements in TfD histories and historiographies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Actors create theatre with and for with children in diverse theatrical, educational and therapeutic contexts but little is known about the 'artistry' of their practice. This paper analyses a theatrical encounter between a child and an actor and identifies four key qualities of 'pedagogically tactful' (van Manen 2016) actor practice: listening, reciprocating, imagining and empathising. In doing so, the artistry of actors who work with children is interpreted as 'aesthetic judgement', involving a relationship between theatrical craft, pedagogy and care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"Relationship, paradoxical curiosity, creativity and risk" are four elements identified John Paul Lederach as necessary for peacebuilding and conflict transformation. The ability to imagine a web of relationships, to be curious about people and their lives as well as being able to image the "other" and take risks are all qualities actors learn through studying Stanislavski's methodology. Based on the first stage of a research project with LAMDA acting students in their second year of drama training this paper explores what Stanislavski's teachings of "given circumstances" and the magic "if" can contribute to the world of conflict transformation. Actors learn to transfer their skills and apply them to work outside the theatre context, which in turn help them reflect on their own development as actors. This paper investigates the intersection of Stanislavski-based actor training and peacebuilding discovering actors' transferable skills and exploring areas such as the multiple perspectives and complex interrelated dynamics of conflict, our positionality, the potential to transform interdependent relationships, and the tools to analyse and transform narratives. It examines how the magic "if" can stimulate deeper understanding and help make the imaginative creative leap necessary to find transcendent solutions to complex conflicts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reconsiders the roles of actors in regional innovation systems in the context of transformative industrial change. Empirically, it draws on evidence from the Värmland region of Sweden, where regional innovation system actors, with partial funding from the Swedish Innovation Agency, are striving to build a bioeconomy upon the traditional forest-related industries. The main findings include that transformative industrial change adds a variety of responsibilities to regional actors, including the provision of change legitimacy, influencing the industry's innovation directionality and achieving social acceptance for change. A combined perspective on sociotechnical transitions and path development in regional innovation systems theoretically informs the case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how actors across spatial levels shape the directions of transition. We examine two Chinese provinces, Inner Mongolia and Jiangsu, with contrasting directionalities of solar photovoltaic (PV) development. The former developed PV as part of the large-scale centralized power system, and the latter focused on PV development as a core element of an alternative distributed form of power generation. We argue that three aspects have been key for understanding the divergent patterns: the specific portfolio of enacted institutional work; the type of interactions between niche and regime actors; and the selective leveraging of national institutional conditions by provincial actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultural gerontology has developed critical work around cultural representations of age and aging and their role in the reproduction of ageism. However, the cultural industries as producers and disseminators of representations remain under researched. This paper draws on a focus group with four older women actors to argue that workforce allocation and assumptions about audience demographics intersect with cultural attitudes around women's aging to impact on older women actors' career opportunities. We argue that ageism within the cultural industries is limiting our ability to develop diverse and non-ageist cultural representation of women's aging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Professional actors learn and generally conduct warm-up processes, which prepare them for the demands of performance. However, they neither learn nor gradually develop post-performance cool-down practices, despite significant activation experienced; this absence is identified as a gap in the actor's training and practice. During the post-performance phase, actors experience adrenaline rush, hot states (emotions) and visceral drives (hunger, thirst, pain or exhaustion), regularly and up to 8 times a week, for weeks or months at a time. Moreover, established cultural norms require the actors' engagement in perpetual performance; the blending of artistic and social performance, which further exacerbates their considerable exertion, especially when combined with alcohol, rendering them exposed to disturbed sleep, alcohol dependency and burn-out. In the first part of this paper, the cool-down is located strictly as a post-performance phase, rather than therapy and distinguished from the de-role and the de-brief, whilst six cool-down processes reflected in literature are evaluated. The second part highlights the imbalance between the emerging academic interest in the cool-down and the lack of practice indicated in contemporary professional stage actors, suggesting that training environments could do more to incorporate the concept and practice of the post-performance cool-down for their actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research proposes a pedagogic practice to increase dynamic independent student participation and engagement through the lens of the flipped classroom, promoting the understanding of learning as a cyclical process of the Revised Bloom's Taxonomy. With recommendations that may support hybrid delivery of actor training delivered both face to face and via online platforms, this paper considers the student learning experience of approaching rehearsals when preparing for a role within the UK actor training conservatoire by applying an overview of the methodologies of two key practitioners to this framework. The publications in the English translation of the practitioners Stanislavski and Hagen have been used, to ensure that as authentic a voice as possible is examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an era of expanding global educational privatization and shifting policies on how to fund educational facilities in many states in the US, this study engages the lenses of critical policy analysis and fiscal sociology to examine educational privatization in the school facilities industry in California. Employing critical policy document analysis to examine approximately 40 primary and secondary source documents including propositions, bills, government and education codes, facilities reports, and state public debt data, this paper addresses the following research question: How have education finance policies shaped the system of school district facilities financing over time, specifically with regard to the field of private actors involved in the school facilities industry? This paper examines the historical policy context for privatization in school district facilities financing, evaluating how policies have evolved, been implemented, and affected stakeholders over time in the broader neoliberal context. Findings indicate that policies promoting privatization in education finance impact school districts’ abilities to provide equitable facilities to their students. Also, the complex and intermittent process of financing school facilities has facilitated the rise of specialized private actors in the school facilities industry that has now organized to engage in private-sector policy setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this Introduction paper, I will describe the motivation behind this special issue on the role of rural-urban relationships in preserving the rural landscape in Europe. Based on the RURBAN project 'Building new relationships in rural areas under urban pressure', the special issue aims to identify the impact of urban pressure on rural landscapes and to explore the contribution of 'rural goods and services' (RGS) to them. This paper will start with an overview of the concepts of rural-urban relationships and RGS, both from a rural perspective and from the perception of different actors, followed by a conceptual model of demand and supply of RGS. To be able to identify differences and similarities across Europe, rural case study regions near a metropolitan area and a tourist area in Finland, France, Hungary, the Netherlands and Spain will be presented. The Introduction paper closes out with a brief overview of the papers in this issue and the themes explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper extrapolates the findings of a three-year study into actor trainers' articulation of their practice. The paper explores the predominant kinds of meanings generated by acting tutors from drama schools in Australia and England in the discussion of their practice. The paper reveals that the predominant kinds of meanings generated by acting tutors in the discussion of their practice were ‘synnoetic’, that is they were direct, personal, and experiential. However, meanings constructed about acting and actor training were known tacitly and therefore were difficult to communicate in conventional ways. This paper identifies the dominant knowledge(s) evidenced in this community of practice in order to further appreciate how ‘teaching’ is understood within the contexts of actor training across these countries with largely Euro-centric approaches to actor training and with implications for practical knowledge(s) in Drama Education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In modern forms of urban governance besides the local government, more partners are often involved in urban regeneration and ‘public–private partnerships’ (PPPs) are formed more frequently. PPPs are part of the ‘environment of actors’, which is formed by the actors involved in the urban regeneration field, the role of these actors and their share of power. PPPs can differ on a spectrum from weak (the decision rights, costs and risks are concentrated in one actor in the PPP) to strong (decision rights, costs and risks are shared between various actors). In this paper PPPs in a power-balanced situation (the Netherlands) and in a power-unbalanced situation (Spain) are examined. Differences in both environments of actors are explained by a different level of welfare state, a different tradition of democracy and differences in the general context of urban regeneration. In these different environments of actors different forms of PPP are formed. These differences are examined and explained in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Employing a theoretical lens from the anthropology of development, this paper takes an actor-oriented approach to understand the socio-cultural context of regional path development in a peripheral rural region and the role of local agency, drawing on a qualitative case study of the Cradle Coast region of Tasmania, Australia. Findings demonstrate the value of bottom-up attention to the logics of regional actors to understand regional development trajectories and the emergence of new economic paths. Analysing the regional development logics and actions of local actors in particular contexts can reveal the mechanisms through which regions create new paths or reinforce old ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the discussion on scholars and university cover-ups demanding critical attention to academic environments which being experienced by diverse actors. Topics include inequitable professional norms around emotional labour undergird the toleration of gendered and sexual harassment in academic environments; and diverse responses to the idea showing identities impacting the academic experiences and vice versa.

Chieftaincy conflicts in Ghana are often presented as disputes involving rival groups over succession to traditional political power. However, chieftaincy conflicts are complex and often shaped by constellation of different actors, national and local level politics and elite maneuvering. This paper argues that chieftaincy conflicts go beyond the structural interpretations of competition and contestation for traditional power, but rather processual, encompassing constellations of diverse actors, elite politics and manipulation. In Northern Ghana, the combination of structural and processual factors drive chieftaincy conflicts. Party politics in chieftaincy conflicts have rendered chieftaincy institutions, that are supposed to be apolitical in nature, political. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EIA has become an important environmental management tool because it is supported by enforceable legal backing. However, its effectiveness has been debated, especially in developing countries where systems are often mimicked from the Western world. EIA in Namibia has been in place since the enactment of the legislation in 2007 and 2012 respectively. This paper investigates EIA's substantive, normative, and transactive effectiveness in Namibia as perceived by key actors. Data were collected through survey questionnaires and triangulated with semi-structured interviews. A total of 110 actors responded to the survey and 25 experts were interviewed. Interviewees perceive EIA in Namibia as moderately and marginally effective in supporting substantive, normative, and transactive effectiveness. They further perceive that various contextual and administrative challenges affect EIA effectiveness in Namibia. Challenges include poor administration, restrained consideration of assessment findings in decisions, limited learning and environmental awareness opportunities, inadequate public participation, funding, and poor monitoring, and reporting. Interviewees also highlighted political will as necessary to improve funding and appropriate institutional arrangement. Actors perceive that projects meant to improve the livelihood of impoverished communities can be accepted while foregoing environmental objectives. With targeted improvements, EIA can effectively facilitate good environmental decisions, resource mobilisation, and sustainability in Namibia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cities and towns are the proximity context where immigrants interact with political actors who can channel their demands. Treating immigration as a salient policy field in this setting reveals how political parties and immigrant associations relate to each other. In this paper, I study when political parties become (or do not become) elite allies of immigrant associations following the approval of policies of exclusion at the local level. To answer my question, I qualitatively study the interaction between these actors with regards to the approval of two policies in two cities in Catalonia, Spain: the burka regulation in Lleida and the exclusion of undocumented immigrants from the local census in Vic. The findings make evident that local factors related to the political conflict over immigration and the associational web provide immigrant associations with varying degrees of agency that condition their relationships with political parties as elite allies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores newspapers’ representation of different actors in infrastructure projects, and analyses the power relations between them through a case study in Hong Kong. The case in question is the highly controversialExpress Rail Link, which connects Hong Kong to the extensive high-speed railway network in mainland China. It finds that under an immature democratic system, opponents’ political power and free press play important roles in forcing the government to make concessions outside the formal framework. The methodological framework employs a concept that takes media representation as a reflection of power [Van Dijk, Teun A. 1996. “Discourse, Power and Access.” InTexts and Practices: Readings in Critical Discourse Analysis, edited by Carmen Caldas-Coulthard and Malcolm Coulthard, 84–104. London: Routledge], and three theories seldom used in the planning field – Indexing Theory [Bennett, W. Lance. 1990. “Toward a Theory of Press-State Relations in the United States.”Journal of Communication40 (2): 103–127. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1990.tb02265.x], Agenda Setting Theory [McCombs, Maxwell E., and Donald L. Shaw. 1972. “The Agenda-Setting Function of Mass Media.”Public Opinion Quarterly36 (2): 176–187] and Law of Anticipated Reactions [Zelditch, Morris, and John Ford. 1994. “Uncertainty, Potential Power, and Nondecisions.”Social Psychology Quarterly57 (1): 64]. A new method for Critical Discourse Analysis, in the form of colour charts, is developed to portray the competition for representation in newspapers of different actors, paying special attention to power inequalities and which actors gain access to newspaper discourse and how they use it to convey specific messages. In this study, 500 newspaper articles (from two key newspapers –SCMPandApple Daily) and 75 government publications in Hong Kong are analysed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Live music has been subject to particular economic and regulatory threats in recent decades. Comparative research of regimes for the planning and management of live music venues was conducted in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne over the period 2008–2010. Methods included archival and legislative reviews, field visits and interviews with key authorities, venue operators, live music campaigners and other actors. This paper gives particular attention to Brisbane's place-based approach, which replaced previous noise, planning and liquor laws to create legislated ‘Entertainment Precincts’. Operators are granted certainty for investment, with increased protection from incompatible development and noise complaints, if they are located in the designated area. In Fortitude Valley, the night-time economy has prospered, preserving and supporting a number of live music venues and giving increased protection to a set of nightclub operators. This functional separation and concentration in Brisbane differs significantly to Melbourne, with its more liberal approach and diffused venues. Brisbane is effectively placing the problems in one key site, leaving the rest of the city with few live music or night-time entertainment options. The paper explores these outcomes and provides options for cities seeking to preserve live music and create accessibility to the night-time economy, but retain amenity for residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the interactions of power as analysed through the formulation story of a recently enacted social policy, the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), India. It explains the various drivers that led to the passing of this policy, with a view to analysing the extent and nature of power as was played out in the making of this policy. The paper sets out the way in which social policy formulation can be understood to be arising from interactions and linkages between individual actors, who together make up policy coalitions and networks. These interactions are described through a four-fold classification of processes (parliamentary, executive, party political and civil society) into which the actions and contributions of these actors feed, giving rise to an iterative, messy and complex reality. Power in the policy formulation network is shown as multi-sited as well as relational. The paper concludes with an endorsement for reconfiguring the geographies of power in the form of a kaleidoscope of actors and events, within and through which power flows and is exercised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methodological shifts in human geography, generally under the banner of the 'cultural turn', have seen an increased focus on methods such as interviews, discourse and textual deconstruction, and the recognition of notions such as reflexivity and intersubjectivity. Together these approaches argue that there is no logical natural order of things or notions of universality. These approaches argue that there is no such thing as objectivity in social research, but that research is informed by the experiences, aims and agency of those performing the research and that researchers should be written into the research environment. Drawing on these insights, the purpose of this paper is to explore a methodological approach centred on actor-network theory (ANT) and suggest how this approach could add value to research being undertaken in human geography. Within such an approach all research findings are created by the researcher through, first, the objectives and framing of a research project and, second, the methods used to create and follow the research network. Drawing on research into residential development and planning on the fringe of Sydney, Australia, this paper has three objectives: first, to position all research as partial and as the product of associations that stretch beyond the research field; second, to argue that all research is a process of translation; and, third, to explore the manner in which we as researchers construct ourselves in efforts to enter networks of research interest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increasing body of research highlights the pivotal role that private entrepreneurs play in driving tourism development. This paper adopts a broader perspective of entrepreneurship, which suggests that entrepreneurial actors are not necessarily defined by business ownership, but by their ability to recognise opportunities and create, organise and implement new ventures that generate value. To explore this broader perspective of entrepreneurship in a tourism development context, this paper presents the findings of a qualitative case study that investigates the evolution of mountain bike tourism at Rotorua in the North Island of New Zealand. Various types of data, including open ended interviews and secondary documentation, were collected and analysed. The findings suggest that the key events that have established Rotorua as a mountain bike destination have predominantly relied on entrepreneurial ventures instigated by public and not-for-profit community bodies. Insights gained highlight the temporal nature of entrepreneurship and that entrepreneurial actors who may not necessarily be considered part of the tourism industry can make a tremendous difference to the development and evolution of tourism activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The revels accounts for November 1604 record a performance of "Merry Wiues of Winsor" on the "Sunday" after "Hallamas Day" by his "Matis Plaiers" in the Banqueting House at Whitehall. This paper asks what The Merry Wives of Windsor might have sounded like to an audience at that site. By resituating Merry Wives in that cultural moment as part of an "aqueous" Christmas season it is possible to reexamine the places "inside" and "outside" of the play as well as the sites "inside" and "outside" of the Banqueting House. This paper offers the first sustained reading of the significance of the Thames for Merry Wives. The geographically informed structure of the paper takes the reader on a journey through the site of Whitehall and the working landscape beyond it. It begins by tracing a "thick description" of the palace architecture before exploring performances, journeys, and labour on the river. It puts the play performance in dialogue with the journeys that brought the actors and audience to Whitehall. The paper argues that the increased liquidity of the Folio is especially attuned to the wider geography of this "event" both "inside" and "outside" the palace in 1604. The paper concludes by turning to the threat Falstaff's wet permeable body poses to the space of the court. Through an examination of the working world of the river it is possible to see how a threatening potentially subversive Thames intruded upon courtly space in 1604. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we expand the concept of historical actors to elaborate on how transformative agency has been addressed in our work with youth from nondominant communities, particularly as they leverage digital tools. First, we revisit our work with migrant students, from which the concept arose. Next, we expand this theory by proposing four indicia of the transformative nature of becoming historical actors, and offer three empirical examples to elucidate them. In our first vignette, we document how, when youth glitch during video game play, they collectively experiment with the rules, regulations, and boundaries of game design, finding ways to circumvent normative video game play and co-author their experiences. In the second vignette, we focus on siblings who take over research video cameras as their family is being filmed. We illustrate how they reshape their relation to the cameras, reorganizing participation structures through their agentive and transgressive actions. Finally, we offer an example from viral media to consider how we might recognize the process of becoming historical actors in the research that youth themselves conduct when they leverage digital tools to document everyday acts of racism, and, importantly, resistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mortality due to violent conflicts or political events (whether interstate, civil wars or conflicts between antagonistic groups, etc.) in countries of Africa is an issue of great concern due to the high number of victims and constant violation of human rights, which occurs daily. The participation of different types of actors, among them rebels, ethnic groups and regular troops, in these violent processes has been widely studied in numerous theoretical works based on a process of perception and intuition. This paper uses spatial modelling methods to empirically examine how these different groups of actors explain the mortality of violent political events in African countries in the period 2014–2015. The main contributions of this work consist in identifying the actors that have the greatest impact on mortality in Africa, as well as the spatial contagion effect caused by them. The results can be of use to policymakers for the design and implementation of geopolitical strategies based on more efficient empirical data with a view to reducing the mortality these actors cause in violent political events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Actors in grand corruption schemes often conspire and deliberately create sophisticated networks to extract huge amounts of public resources from government systems. They hide such conspiracies behind hybrid formal/informal arrangements. Using a mixed methods approach, this study investigates the corruption scheme initiated by former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo and the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht Group. We argue that separating the networks of the client (Odebrecht) and the agent (Toledo) sides provides analytical leverage for studying complex corrupt arrangements. We found that the organizational forms designed by corrupt actors on either side were essential to ensuring the secret and safe operation of the network. Introducing the concept of organizational form into corruption research helps better understand the nature of these networks. We also found that different parts of the networks are shaped by different types of corruption. The article concludes with implications for practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When the Tanzanian film actor Steven Kanumba suddenly died aged 28 in 2012, the shocking news spread quickly via word of mouth and through the media. Some 30 000 people and high-ranking politicians joined in the public mourning at the funeral service; hundreds of young women fainted and the police were barely able to keep control over the evolving mass panic. After the funeral, the media event of Kanumba’s death continued in literature, news scandals, discourses, and myth, as well as in his post-mortem appearance in a movie. This paper looks at these mass-mediated practices and discourses of mourning and commemoration to reveal Kanumba’s social function as a celebrity in Tanzania, as well as the meaning and significance people ascribe to both his death and the relation between the real person and his fictional character in films. With these after-life productions, producers, fans, family, friends, as well as former enemies engage in the cooperative creation of a postmortem mythology through which they make meaning of Kanumba’s life and death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores some hitherto overlooked intersections between British documentary of the 1930s and 1940s and celebrity culture. It does so through the analysis of voice-over commentary in a range of different films from this period. There is currently an opening for new types of scholarship in this area of film history because many previously unavailable British documentaries, including the majority of those discussed in this paper, have recently become available through DVD releases or websites such as the BFI'sScreenonline. The paper rejects the common assumption that voice-over commentary within these films was a reductive, standardised ‘Voice of God’ technique that can be quickly dismissed. Instead, this paper argues that focusing on the newsreel commentators, actors, public intellectuals and broadcasters who provided commentaries for British documentary films during this period extends and nuances our understanding of the histories of both factual film and celebrity, especially since these films became nodal points for multimedia personalities already established in other media. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We argue that the concept of a policy prolepsis is a category of becoming-policy that actualizes educational practices within spaces of desired policy initiatives and implementations. Policy prolepses represent a range of emergent policy ontologies produced through the interface of educational actors’ senses of policy and their estimations of possible outcomes. We use Deleuze's (1990) logic of sense to argue that becoming-policy occurs in a pre-conscious space, and that this space is produced politically and used strategically for desired, yet ostensibly unformed, policy outcomes. Educational policy, then, is an ontological activity representing a myriad of policy outcomes through the management of semiotic desires and actors’ inferences about these persuasive signs. The paper illustrates the practical idea of policy prolepsis by demonstrating how policy apparitions use fear in becoming-policy. Policy apparitions, then, are just one species of policy prolepses that utilize the affect of fear to manipulate educational actors’ interpretations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the roles and actions of civil society actors and state agencies in the establishment and management of the Rouge Park (Ontario, Canada), a large greenspace approximately 46 km2. This paper takes the stance that neoliberalism is more than just a simple derivative of capitalism, but also a continually evolving process that has explicit links to nature and its management. I use qualitative data to investigate how the governance framework put in place by the province of Ontario amounts to the neoliberalisation of conservation, where a disproportionate amount of the day-to-day management and operation of the park is completed by civil society actors and their respective volunteers. I examine how the management structure of the Rouge Park has resulted in what amounts to neoliberal conservation policy yet, despite its apparent and upfront shortcomings, this governance scheme has also resulted in some notable developments. In particular, it has provided an increase in opportunities for civil society actors to become key agents in both park planning and conservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to understand the restrictions media actors face in their day-to-day work in Acholiland, northern Uganda, and identify the strategies they adopt to maintain a space for dialogue and debate. Two case studies reveal that it is difficult to see how media actors in this conflict environment can play a significant role in holding the ruling government to account and promoting peace building when they are facing repressive media laws, intimidation, a lack of information, and weak managerial support. This paper calls for policies to support the daily struggles of media actors, such as the adoption of the African Peer Review Mechanism - an instrument used for self-monitoring by participant countries of New Partnership for Africa's Development. Thus, the investigation turns away from questions of censorship to investigating what can be done to support the daily struggles of media actors who are constantly negotiating their way through a labyrinth of restrictions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper juxtaposes the predicaments of two popular stars in Asia whose mobility in their respective cultural fields became challenged by political sentiments in 2004. Chang Hui-Mei (A-Mei), the aboriginal pop diva from Taiwan, became the target of a protest organized by Chinese ‘patriots’ before a performance in Hangzhou. The event set off a series of public debates involving high-level Taiwanese politicians, fans, and members of the public that recalled a similar controversy in 2000 when A-Mei was banned in China after singing at the inauguration of President Chen Shui-Bian. Some months later, Korean Wave star Song Seung-Heon became the subject of a draft-dodging investigation while he was shooting a highly anticipated TV drama, Sad Love Story. Support from different configurations of overseas fans poured in and remained strong even after he gave up the project and began his mandatory military service. Using these two parallel cases to reveal how politics and entertainment interact in Asia independent of stars’ volition, this paper investigates the affective investment and communication strategies of A-Mei’s cross-strait fans and Song’s Chinese-Asian fans during these emotion-laden circumstances. The inter-referential approach of this paper not only reveals the importance of considering patriotism as a latent (rather than exceptional) political and popular force in trans-Asian popular culture, but also reconfigures the relationships between the public, popular, and political in inter-Asia cultural traffic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses previously unpublished letters from Jean Renoir to give an in‐depth account of the pre‐production, production and post‐production stages of The River (Jean Renoir, 1951). It focuses on the process of adapting the script from Rumer Godden's novel, the problems encountered shooting on location in India with inexperienced actors, inadequate equipment, untried technology (Technicolor, magnetic tape), plus the editing process and last minute writing of a voice‐over. This paper outlines how these events determine the film's visual and aural style, and the pivotal role the film plays in Renoir's career. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the ethics of the contract between the performer and client group in applied theatre practice. The paper examines the problematics of the conventional drama framework as a fictional space of pretence. What are the ethics of activities carried out in a context of disbelief? How can the contradictions between the agreement to ‘pretend’ and the encounter with real lives be addressed? The work featured is undertaken within a self-reflexive framework wherein the concept of being ‘in role’ is not allied with deception. All the companies and practitioners featured use modes of participatory theatre in which the collaboration between the performer/animateur and the spect/actor or client is negotiated in a space between the ‘real’ and the ‘not real’ so that the participants are conscious that the situations played out, although ‘live’ are both real and not real while the performers are more explicit about their roles than in more conventional theatre frameworks. This space between performance and ordinary life, as I will demonstrate, is a space for intervention and change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two recent Czech films, Jan Svěrák's Tmavomodrý svět/Dark Blue World (2001) and Vojtěch Jasný's Návrat ztraceného ráje/Which Side Eden (1999) have employed a dual-language format of English and Czech. This paper investigates the artistic and cultural reasons, and commercial demands for such a decision within the context of contemporary Czech culture and the worldwide film industry. Svěrák has been outspoken in his criticism of the pressures placed on him to film the entire film in the English language, a criticism absorbed into and dealt with in the film. Concurrently, he employed well-known British actors, which lent the film wider distributor and audience appeal. This paradox indicates the pressures on the film industry, which, until recently, has regarded subtitled 'foreign' films as commercially non-viable and the pressures on the Czech film industry constricted to a small native-language audience base. The paper examines to what extent both films reflect these pressures by choosing a dual-language format, and whether they are indicative of a change in Czech film. The paper will explore this aspect also in the context of world film, which has become more acceptant of dual-language films not only in the art-film sphere but also in mainstream Hollywood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Making and applying the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) is an example of `Europeanization'. Europeanization is the outcome of the interaction between actors with various motivations. in the case of the ESDP process, these motivations reflect the spatial planning traditions and the institutional set-ups of the relevant actors. As a preliminary, the paper describes the ESDP. It then analyses the motivations, reflecting as they do their spatial planning traditions and institutional set-ups, of four key actors without whom the ESDP would not have been what it is: France, the Netherlands, Germany and the European Commission. The paper ends with a discussion of the prospects of European spatial planning after enlargement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]